2016-10-21 05:10:28

Hello guys,
Just wondering, does anyone knows some good movies similar to The Sound of Music? I've watched The Sound of Music, and I kind of like that movie. Are there movies similar to this one?
Thanks.

2016-10-21 07:49:25

Similar in what ways?

There are certainly plenty of musicals with good plots, from West side story to Sweeny Tod (not to mention Phantom and Les Miserables), indeed my lady and I both as singers have plenty of them and sing songs from them frequently (my lady actually has a singing voice rather reminiscent of Juley Andrews in Sound of music).

On the other hand, if you mean films about families fleeing nazi occupation, well there are likely plenty of those too, though I'm not entirely the person to ask about those.

Btw, it's a bit odd to hear someone saying how much they like Sound of music now, not that there's anything wrong with it (albeit I do now find the kids a little overly hollywood cute on occasions), just that it's something I grew up with. My mum showed me the film when I was quite young, and I even saw the musical version on stage a couple of times, so it's a little odd to run into "somewhere in my youth or child hood" (to appropriate a song title), on this forum now big_smile.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2016-10-21 14:33:00

If you are looking for musicals, you might also enjoy stuff like Mary Poppins although it's more fantasy. It's very classic Disney from the 1960's, with songs written by the Sherman Brothers. The Jungle Book is also good.
Also, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is good too.
If you want something a bit more modern but with music, then Disney has done that too. Films like Little Mermaid, Lion King, Aladdin, Beautey and The Beast, there are others but I'll leave it there for now.

2016-10-21 14:58:01

Yeah, just saying similar is a pretty open question. The Sound of Music could be called, a musical, a war story, a romance, and so on. If you are looking for musicals, there's always The Wizard of Oz. So, similar how?

2016-10-21 15:12:19

I actually saw the on stage musical version of Mary Poppins while in the states this summer. It was awesome since while it uses all the disney songs, it's a rather more serious and in some places darker story, it even has an evil nanny who is the reason why Michael senior, the children's father is something of a git.

It probably says something about me, but i love Mrs Andrew's the evil nanny's songg, Brimstone and treacle, a wonderfully nasty counterpart to Mary Poppins and spoon full of sugar, you can Listen to it here

As to other films, yep, huge fan of the disney renaesence era, particularly The LIon King, though i am also a huge fan of beauty and the beast, hunchback and yes, frozen (even if there is nothing I can sing in it).

Actually, Beauty and the beast is particularly special since the words to the main "tale as old as time" song could've been written theme for my lady and I as they describe our circumstances frighteningly well.

So yes, musicals = awesome, then again as a tenor who sings a lot of that sort of thing i would say that big_smile.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2016-10-22 03:23:26

Ok, thanks everyone for the feedback. I might check some of the recommend movies later.

2016-10-22 16:10:35

There are some great musicals, but by far and away the best ones are those by Disney. Their musicals routinely have so many great songs in them.

2016-10-22 21:06:56

Depends upon the disney Figment. I can't say much for Hercules, and many of their 70's stuf was rather lacking, eg, robin hood, aristocats etc, much as I love many of their nineties films.

Also with disney having a very set family friendly audience, the subject matter for their songs and music is fairly limited. Hunchback pushed things pretty far out, but there are just things Disney can't do. For example, my lady and I the other week performed an extremely awesome scene from The Secret guarden musical in which Archibald, a widower is having a major breakdown, which he's bought out of by seeing the ghost of his dead wife.

It's an incredible scene with two awesome songs, but emotionally is down right nasty since your pretty much dealing with a man about to kill himself.
There's also no way some of the really amazingly nasty bits of phantom westside story or les miserables would work in a disney, nor would they quite be able to tdo the dark surreal humour of something like little shop of horrors.

The general disney ethos also did rather get in the way of some aspects of story telling, indeed when I've seen broadway adaptations of disney musicals some of the insertions are quite astounding, for example the beast has an absolutely amazing song (one I'd love to do if I weren't a tenor rather than a baritone), about being stuck if he can't love bell.

Don't get me wrong, I love disneys. A lot of disney music is part of my standard material to sing, indeed I could probably recite the script of the lion king verbatim having seen it that much, the same is almost true of other disneys, however disney has a fairly limited scope just because of their audience and philosophy and these days also because of their appeal to market trends rather than telling stories too, hence why I'd never agree with a blanket "disneys are the best" sort of statement.

Btw, I've been reading and keeping up with a rather interesting blog on tor.com, a readwatch and then a rewatch of all the disney classics from snow white onwards, including some of the lesser known ones.
I really like the comments, the humour, and indeed a lot of the observations and history, particularly since Mari ness, the lady who writes it gets into things like the original source material disney films were taken from, and also the circumstances and happenings within disney themselves when the films were being made.

So, if you like disney's it's worth a read, find the main blog here

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2016-10-22 22:17:37

@Dark: that's interesting. I actuall enjoyed Hercules for what it was, due to the soundtrack and songs. I found it very grand in nature.
The Lion King is probably my favourite film of all time. Not just my favourite Disney film, but my actual, favourite, film. The utter specticle that it offers, the music is very layered, the morals, the very scheming and evil villain, the list goes on. The thing about the music is during each song's verse and chorus, the orchestral arrangements actually change.
If you are interested in the music, I'd seriously recommend checking out Walt Disney Records Legacy Collection Lion King. This is a two-disc set, which is in a book, quite literally. You open the book and you've got behind the scenes, then right at the end of the book are the two discs in pockets. Disc 1 has the complete score in film order, so you've got Circle of Life, but then you've got Scaa's orchestral theme, and it continues like that, right through the film with all the songs and score interconnected. Some of the orchestral tracks are really long here we're talking 7 minutes, and i think the last track called the Rightful King is 9 minutes.
Disc 2 has demo scores and songs that didn't make the cut, which is especially interesting.
I ended up getting a lot of other Legacy Collection cds as well, I think there are 12 of them, I think I decided to go for 7 of them throughout the year. Toy Story has a whopping 50 tracks on the first disc alone, and is the only one where, on the second disc, after the demo songs, they actually added official instrumentals of all three of the film's songs with just the backing vocals, so it's great to hear how the orchestrations sound from that perspective.
Legacy Collection Cinderella is my latest and probably last one, and that one is probably the most interesting of the bunch, the second disc's songs are really cool because you have original demo recordings done with a piano, followed by an orchestral arrangement with guest vocalists. I can also recommend Legacy Collection Mary Poppins which has a similr thing, but the Cinderella songs were so different on disc 2 than their final film counterparts, it's interesting to hear how it evolved and how the early concepts were different.

2016-10-22 22:33:29

Different strokes for different folks!

I liked Hercules, however I don't recall it being a musical, maybe the one I saw wasn't by Disney?

I don't recall Robin Hood being a musical either,although I enjoyed the movie, it definitely wasn't Disney's best effort by a long shot.

I loved Aristocats! But then I was a kid when I first saw it on a Christmas Eve. I listened to the audio description of it during the past year, I still liked the movie, but the adult in me didn't think it was as as good as the kid in me remembers.

2016-10-23 10:42:47

@Aaron, I'm afraid I just never bought Hercules, either in character or concept, since the mix of griek myths with very american humour and jaz plus lots of slaptstick didn't quite work for me, for all Hades is pretty awesome.

Those legacy recordings sound great, I actually do have a similar thing for Frozen featuring the demo recordings with piano. Cinderella really could've done with a bit more to it, indeed it's interesting that in her blog Mari Ness comments that though the disneys are often cryticised for the roll of women, the princes really don't do much else other than be blandd, indeed in early disney's it's usually the villain who stands out most, other than sleeping beauty which I need to watch again for awesomeness.

@Figment, Yep, Robin hood had songs, albeit the only one I remember is sung by everyone in gaol. The Aristocats wasn't essentially a bad film, just again not particularly an effort like The Lion king or some more recent disneys, then again i confess I've probably not got as much tolerance for sweet for the sake of sweet unless there's a hefty serving of dark to counterbalance, ---- interestingly enough my lady and I are doing the audio described harry potter films at the moment and while I did enjoy the first two more than I remember doing, the shiny happy atmosphere in them definitely is a bit out, and ascaban was absolutely as awesome as I remember precisely because! it goes into grim.

This is why I love the lion king with it's manipulative villains and probably the most moving death in disney history (sorry Bamby's mother was sad certainly but not half this bad), the plot, the spectacle the characters, it got the balance right.

I also do love Hunchback for the same reason, though for the record my lady did find Hunchback a little too! dark what with the religious mania and lustful obsession, ---- plus damnit a film which is supposed to be all about how it's not what you look like but who you are that counts which ends with the main girl leaving the uggly but sensative guy for the goodlooking if admitedly transparently nice guy? ---- Sorry but if your going to change the ending to the book where everyone dies at least give Quasy a break! big_smile.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2016-10-23 16:05:59

If Robin Hood was a musical, it apparently wasn't good enough to be memorable.

Remember that the first time I saw Aristocats was as a kid and kids tend to like candy in all it's forms. The movie did have a villain, but his role was rather small compared to Disney's other villains.

And, by Hunchback are you referring to The Hunchback of Notre Dame?

2016-10-23 22:19:55

Yep figment, Hunchback =  the hunchback of notre dame.

I watched through most, if not all the disney canon as a child, mostly introduced to films like the Junglebook, Aristocats, Bamby and The rescuers by my mum, though I had audio cassette stories of some of them including sleeping beauty. then of course, since the renaesance films were just my era given I was 7 in 1989 when Little mermaid came out, I went to see beauty and the beast on it's first release then pretty much went every year to whatever was next, it almost became an iconic thing that only stopped when the big musical releases stopped with Tarzan, indeed I still remember being 12 and learning how good The Lion King was from an American Lady, since back then if something came out in the states we didn't get it over here for another six months.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)